Saturday, January 8, 2011

The (start of the) Update

So, where should I start? Though I haven't been blogging much, I've been journalling with some frequency. I'll have an account of many of my adventures within the last month or so.

December 2: waited outside of the CBC builing for three hours waiting for rush seats to see a taping of Jian Gomeshi's show "Q." And it was cold. But the company was pretty good! The show was plenty of fun, and Sarah MacLachlan was one of the guests. She played a couple of songs, including Adia. Musical Guest also was a great Vancouver band called Black MountainAfter the show, I waited in the lobby with a few dozen other fans for the Jian meet-and-greet. Attempting to avoid the rush, I waited until most people had left to approach, and it turned out that I was the last person to meet Jian. I passed him my journal to sign in, and he mentioned that he loves writing in peoples' journals. cool. His inscription was:

dear Sarah Ball...by hook or by crooki ended up in your book.Thank you for afforing me a spot.Here's to wishing you magical daysYours, Jian

And then by luck, I got to ride the elevator with Jian!

me and Jian in the elevator

I told my parents about the visit with Jian, and the elevator ride, my dad told me "you've got a knack for riding in elevators with CBC personalities! Do you remember riding the elevator at CBC Toronto with Wayne Rostad?" No, I actually didn't remember...until I spent some time jogging my memory from 15 years ago...Wayne hosted a show on CBC for 20 years called On the Road Again.

Wayne Rostad, mid-1990's

December 3rd: Went to the CBC Vancouver open house and food bank day. Swung by the CBC for a tour, and some more meet-and-greets!

I (very briefly) met George Strombolopoulos!

I missed pressing the "record" button on my phone, but before the video starts, the conversation went like this:

Sarah(from across a room while George was about to leave): George! Tell my mom "I love you!"George crosses tent towards meGeorge: Hi mom! Where are you? Where are you? I miss you...Sarah: She's in Kamloops...video startsGeorge: In Kamloops? Oh no! I did a show there a while ago and I missed you? I'm sorry I missed you!George blows my mom a kissSarah has her day made. Awesome.

And then a few hours later, I met Peter Mansbridge, who apparently isnt' all that tech savy despite being Peter Mansbridge. I wrote his "teleprompt" for him (Merry Christmas J & S [my parents]) to say into my cameraphone, but somehow the video came out like this:

December 10th: my friends and I celebrated our friend C's birthday a week late. We made up for forgetting his birthday when I made him this cake:

(I know. It's effing awesome. And it was delicious.)

December 17th: Left Vancouver to drive to 108Mile House for a friend's wedding on the Greyhound bus. The trip was brutal because I'd been up till 3am the night before in an attempt to finish sewing my party dress for the occasion. I had a small mental breakdown because the silk was just not working for me, and I'd gotten into a rut where absolutely every seam I sewed had a mistake. Thankfully, M helped me out, and sewed the sash for me. Nice guy!

The wedding in 108n Mile house was held at The Hills Health Ranch. On a scale of 1-10, I'd give this place a 7. The setting was beautiful, the cabin we'd rented was cute and comfortable (and twice the size of our apartment), the Nordic Skiing was delicious, and the massage was heavenly, but the food was just o.k for the price we were paying, and I came down with Norwalk on the day we were leaving. I suppose the Norwalk thing wasn't their fault, but another wedding guest had come down with it two days earlier at the resort, and I wasn't happy with the ranch's response (essentially telling the girl that she couldn't cancel her spa appointments because nobody else was sick, and inferring that perhaps she was just hungover). And when I was sick too, I had M tell the front desk, but I severe doubts that the housekeeping staff would do anything different in their usual cleaning routine, despite the fact that I'm sure my Norwalk-y germs were all over everything in that cabin.

The wedding itself was plenty of fun. Pretty low-key and was fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants. But I liked it because it was proof that you don't have to micro-manage everything in order to throw a great party! Somehow, the lady bartender allowed one of the wedding guests ( a bartender in Kamloops) behind the bar, and few people had to pay for drinks at all! Even when someone threw down $30 for shots to the lady bartender, she poured 15 shots! Lots of people got crazy drunk. I didn't...which was probably a good idea, because the next morning was the morning I got sick. I won't go into that much because many of you are probably snacking while reading this (really long) blog post and I don't want to ruin your appetite.

That's about all the blog I've got in me for now. I've got plenty more to write about, but my friends are starting to feel like I'm ignoring them...Me and Sami Salo of the Vancouver Canucks. A bunch of the canucks visited the Children's Hospital where I work in mid December. I asked if Sami would pose as The Hulk, and then demo'd what I wanted, and instead he gave me this. Yeesh. I look meaner than he does in this picture....